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Jenna Miscavige Hill

Former scientologist.
Notably, niece of of Church of Scientology leader, David Miscavige.

Here is "Jenna Miscavige Hill's letter to Karin Pouw" if you are looking for it.

Jenna Miscavige Hill's posts on "Ex-Scientology Kids".


Jenna Miscavige Hill: "Ex-Scientology Kids: My Story"

[...] [David] Miscavige says Scientology can offer its followers greater ability in all areas of life, rid people of negativity, and make them "clear."

But some former members of the Sea Organization, or Sea Org (Scientology's version of clergy -- the group of people who essentially run the church), including a niece of Miscavige, see another side to the religion. They spoke to "Nightline" about how they became increasingly disillusioned with the Church of Scientology, until they decided it was time to leave. [...]

From ages 6 to 12, Hill lived at a Scientology-owned property in California that was known as "the ranch," where she said children as young as 6 had long days. In addition to reading, writing and arithmetic classes and studying Scientology, she said there were physical chores.

"These projects ranged from rock hauling, taking rocks out of the creek, picking them up, hauling them up a hill, putting them in a pile -- these were usually to make rock walls," she said.

As a little girl Hill said she remembers weeding for hours, "no matter how hot or how cold it was outside." [...]

ABC News (April 24, 2008): "Ex-Scientology Kids Share Their Stories"
[...] Ron Miscavige has remained silent since his defection. He did not return Radar's phone calls or e-mails. But his daughter, Jenna Miscavige HillDavid's niece—caused an uproar in February by writing an open letter to Pouw denouncing the Church's policy of "disconnection," in which followers are forced to forgo contact with anyone declared a suppressive person, even family members. Pouw had previously issued a statement in response to Morton's book, claiming that disconnection is "the opposite of what the Church believes and practices."

That, Hill says, is not true. "If they're so arrogant that they can completely lie when people know the truth, they're not going to change," she says. "I felt like I had to say something."

Radar (March 17, 2008): "Cult Friction" by John Cook
[...] Ron Miscavige has remained silent since his defection. He did not return Radar's phone calls or e-mails. But his daughter, Jenna Miscavige HillDavid's niece—caused an uproar in February by writing an open letter to Pouw denouncing the Church's policy of "disconnection," in which followers are forced to forgo contact with anyone declared a suppressive person, even family members. Pouw had previously issued a statement in response to Morton's book, claiming that disconnection is "the opposite of what the Church believes and practices."

That, Hill says, is not true. "If they're so arrogant that they can completely lie when people know the truth, they're not going to change," she says. "I felt like I had to say something."

Hill says the Church tried to keep her from talking to her parents from 2000, when they left the Church (she was 16 at the time), until 2005, when she followed suit. Moreover, she describes a harrowing childhood as a third-generation Scientologist, in which, even as a small child, her life was heavily regimented and she was required to do manual labor. [...]

"I saw my parents once a week," Hill says. Along with 80 other children of staff at Gold Base, she says, she woke up every morning at 6:30, put on a uniform, and cleaned her room until inspection at 7 a.m. Then she worked handing out vitamins to other kids. After that, she says, "We'd do rock hauling and demolition, dig trenches, plant trees." When the grueling physical chores were done, she would study academics and Scientology materials until 9:30 p.m. "It's kind of weird when you're six or seven years old to have to study until 9:30 at night," she says. "We had units, we had to call people Sir, we did close-order drilling. It was run like a military organization." [...]

During her four years in Clearwater, Hill says she went to school once a week. She spent the rest of her time studying Scientology and performing administrative work. Her parents stayed back at Gold Base, and Hill says she saw her mother "once for about a half-hour" and her father "three times for at most a half-hour each time" over those four years. [...]

One day, when Hill was 16, the local head of the Religious Technology Center, the body in charge of enforcing Church doctrine, told her she needed a "sec check," or security check—a lengthy inquest using an E-meter. "I was interrogated eight hours a day for six weeks," she says. "I couldn't talk to my friends. I had to put on a grubby uniform, and when I wasn't being interrogated, I had to clean the bathroom. When I slept, there was always someone guarding the room." She was never told why. [...]

Hill never attended school again. During her time in the L.A. Sea Org, she says, all of her parents' letters to her were intercepted, and she was forced to read and answer questions about them in the presence of Rinder. She eventually married a fellow Scientologist named Dallas. In 2005, after a particularly aggressive auditing session in which she was questioned for hours because she criticized her superiors for attempting to take away her cell phone—Hill's only mode of contact with her parents—she announced that she wanted to leave the Church. "It was after a culmination of a lifetime of things," she says, that the cell phone issue finally flipped a switch in her head. [...]

Ex-Scientology Kids (March 15, 2008): "The Church Contacted Me..."

Hi Guys, Please repost this everywhere you can. This is why I am doing what I am doing.

So where do I begin.... I did an interview this week with ABC nightline. They of course had to call the Church for comment which they did.

Last night at 11pm while we were in bed we got a call from Dallas's father. He said he was 20 minutes away from our house and he was driving down from a meeting he had today and in the car with him were 2 Sea Org members from OSA Int and they were coming to talk to us at our house.

He said that they had come to talk to him but he insisted that we should be there and that they wanted to talk to us. So they just decided it was okay to drop in on us in the middle of the night in true Sea Org style. [...]

They pleaded with me to pull the ABC Nightline deal. They said if I did, they would go through and cancel all of the B.S. allegations about me, that they would see about lifting the declare on several of my friends and would get all the data out on the table.

After Dallas's parents pleaded with us to try and cooperate so that they wouldn't have to decide between us and Scientology, we told them we would think about it and would call them the next morning. They tried to pressure us into making a descision then and there and we told them that it wasn't gonna happen. They told us not to talk to anybody about this meeting and to please not post about it on the internet. [...]

Los Angeles Times (March 3, 2008): "Scientology taking hits online"

[...] "We were born. We grew up. We escaped."

So reads the motto of ExScientologyKids.com, a website launched Thursday by three young women raised in the Church of Scientology who are speaking out against the religion. Their website accuses the church of physical abuse, denying some children a proper education and alienating members from family.

One of the women behind the site, Jenna Miscavige Hill, is the niece of David Miscavige, the head of the church, and Kendra Wiseman is the daughter of Bruce Wiseman, president of the Citizens Commission on Human Rights, a Scientology-sponsored organization opposed to the practice of psychiatry. [...]

Newsweek (February 8, 2008): "The Passion of 'Anonymous'"

These are unfriendly times to be a Scientologist. In December, Germany's Interior Ministry moved to ban the organization, which has tax-exempt religious status in the United States. In January, St. Martin's Press published Andrew Morton's salacious unauthorized biography of Tom Cruise, which describes the star as its de facto second in command. The church responded with a 15-page statement, calling the book "a bigoted, defamatory assault replete with lies" and saying Cruise "is a Scientology parishioner and holds no official or unofficial position in the Church hierarchy." Jenna Hill Miscavige, a niece of church leader David Miscavige who left the fold in 2005, this week came out in support of Morton and slammed the organization for, among other things, its practice of "disconnection--essentially severing contact with family members seen as hostile to the group. [...]

The Daily Telegraph (February 7, 2008): "Scientology insider turns on church"

THE Church of Scientology is facing two major battles, as the niece of the cult's leader has gone public about bizarre rituals she was forced to endure while an anonymous group begins an online war.

Jenna Hill Miscavige, 24, the daughter of David's older brother Ron, recently came out in support of Andrew Morton's Tom Cruise: An Unauthorized Biography, and slammed the star for "supporting a religion that tears apart families, both in the media and monetarily".

Since then, Jenna claims she's been subjected to harassment, report the NY Post. [...]

The Daily Telegraph (February 6, 2008): "David Miscavige's niece claims she has been harassed by the Church of Scientology"

The niece of a Church of Scientology leader alleges she has been harassed since speaking out against the religion.

Jenna Hill Miscavige, the daughter of official David Miscavige’s older brother Ron, recently came out in support of the controversial Andrew Morton book, “Tom Cruise: An Unauthorized Biography”.

It contains a string of lurid allegations against the star and his religion - which have been denied by the Top Gun star’s lawyers.

And she slammed Cruise himself for “supporting a religion that tears apart families, both in the media and monetarily”, according to the New York Post. [...]

Inside Edition (February 5, 2008): "Scientology's royal family"

Agence France-Presse (January 28, 2008): "Niece of Scientology's leader backs Cruise biography"

The author of a controversial new biography on celebrity Scientologist Tom Cruise has found an unexpected new ally: the niece of Scientology's current leader, David Miscavige.

In an open letter to a senior Scientology official that has been widely posted on the Internet, Jenna Miscavige Hill described how her own family was broken apart by the movement's policies.

Hill's father is Ron Miscavige, the older brother of David Miscavige, the current leader of the Church of Scientology.

"Hell, if Scientology can't keep his family together -- then why on earth should anyone believe the church helps brings families together!" she wrote. [...]

(January 25, 2008): "Jenna Miscavige Hill's letter to Karin Pouw"

[...] As you well know, my parents officially left the Church when I was 16 in 2000. I, having been separated from them at the age of 12 and thoroughly engulfed in the beliefs of the Church since birth decided not to go with them.

Not only was I not allowed to speak to them, I was not allowed to answer a phone for well over a year, in case it was them calling me. To give exact specifics, this "law" was enforced ruthlessly by one Tracye Danilovoch — the local representative for the Religious Technology Center — who intercepted all letters from my parents (and my friends). She would then pass them on to Marc Rathbun (the then 2nd in command of the Church) and Mike Rinder — who happens to be the former head of YOUR office — "The Office of Special Affairs" (you can thank me later for not elaborating on this one). Only after they had seen the letters and decided it was ok for me to see them would I receive some of them while sitting in a board room while they watched me read them and asked me to comment on them. [...]